Brecon Festival Ballet (BFB) is excited to present its first ever spring production at Theatr Brycheiniog on April 6 and 7.

BFB’s annual Nutcracker production is now a regular feature in the Brecon Christmas calendar, but this new production showcases two short ballets - Swan Lake Act 2 and Tanio’r Ddraig (Fire Up Your Dragon).

Swan Lake is probably the world’s most famous ballet, based on the ancient legend of a woman cursed to take swan form during the day and only returning to human form by night. The ballet features Tchaikovsky's beautiful and haunting music and mesmerising choreography from the original production in 1895 by Lev Ivanov and Marius Petipa. In contrast to this well-known classic, Tanio’r Ddraig is a brand new ballet for Wales, featuring some of Wales’ best known traditional songs (such as Myfanwy, Men of Harlech, Tros y Garreg and Sospan Fach) reimagined in the language of dance. These songs are linked by original composition by local pianist, Penny Hughes, who plays the ballet live to accompany the dancers and the backdrop is a series of original paintings of local scenery by Brecon-based artist, Phil Clark.

Based on her 24 years of living in Brecon, choreographer Katy Sinnadurai BEM has choreographed a suite of dances to represent snapshots from the life of a Welsh town, including significant moments such as the town’s Eisteddfod, a local love story and the defence of the town. There are also comic interludes, seaside reminiscences and, always by their side, the presence of Y Ddraig Goch, the Red Dragon.

The lead roles of Odette, the Swan Queen and Y Ddraig Goch, the Red Dragon, will be danced by two wonderful, experienced professional dancers, Natasha Trigg and Harlan Rust. Both of these dancers grew up in Brecon and had their early dance training here, before going on to full time training and impressive, international professional careers.

These lead dancers are joined by 18 other professional dancers for Swan Lake and a cast of 50 onstage for Tanio’r Ddraig.

Tickets are on sale at the theatre box office or on their website: www.brycheiniog.co.uk/en